As a memorial to the death of Lou Reed today,
I thought I’d rush this mix and post it immediately.This is a reconstruction of the fabled ‘lost
fourth album’ by The Velvet Underground, recorded in-between 1969’s The Velvet
Underground and 1970’s Loaded.Although
much of this material has been released as the 1985 compilation album VU, the label
made no attempt to reproduce that lost fourth album.In contrast to VU, this reconstruction
attempts to be true to what the actual fourth Velvet Underground might have
been like.I also utilized alternate
sources of the songs from those contained on VU in order to include the longest
edits of the songs as well as the best mastering available.

By 1969, we have a completely different Velvet Underground.After recording an album intended to be the polar
opposite of White Light/White Heat with John Cale’s more musically apt (albeit
less experimental) replacement Doug Yule, the band enjoyed critical success with
their The Velvet Underground album, even though commercial success still eluded
them.Being tired of MGM Records—or perhaps
reading the writing on the wall and anticipating a drop from the label due to a
lack of commercial potential—the band continued recording a follow-up to The
Velvet Underground while touring throughout 1969, biding their time until their
management found a better label.This
follow-up, once complete, was indefinitely shelved by MGM as The Velvet Underground
was no longer on their roster anyways.It remained unheard until the tapes were accidentally
found and released as the 1985 and 1986 compilation albums VU and Another
View.

Recorded at The Record Plant from May to October 1969, the
actual band members have differing opinions on what the intent of these
recordings was.In interviews, bandleader
Lou Reed expressed that the 1969 Record Plant recordings were meant for their fourth
album—specifically noting that “We’re Gonna Have A Real Good Time Together” was
meant as it’s ironic lead single.Mo Tucker
sides with Reed, in that she was under the impression they were recording a
proper forth album, although she confusingly claims that The Record Plant
recordings found on VU and Another View were not it.Doug Yule
however claimed they were simply professionally-recorded demos for the album
that would eventually be Loaded.Sterling
Morrison offers a completely different explanation: that the recordings were
simply “busy work”, a put-on so that MGM would not suspect the band as wanting
out of their contract, and that these recordings were never even meant to see
the light of day.Who are we to believe, if we believe any of
this at all?

For the purposes of this reconstruction we will assume Reed
and Tucker to be correct, and collect the Record Plant sessions into this album
they were purportedly recording.We will
also need to assume that Tucker is mistaken, and that The Record Plant sessions
were indeed the lost album; 40 years later, what else possibly could it
be?Had they recorded an undocumented album’s
worth of material that somehow escaped Velvet Underground historians for decades?Unlikely…

While we don’t know what exactly would have been on the “lost
forth album”, we do have fourteen finished songs, recorded at a state-of-the-art
recording studio from the exact same time period in question.Seems more than a coincidence!While the 1985
album VU also includes the unreleased single “Stephanie Says” and “Temptation Inside
Your Heart”, we must resist the temptation inside our hearts (no matter what Stephanie says) to include these
two songs as they were most likely not a part of this project.Of the fourteen tracks recorded in 1969, we
will exclude the early version of “Rock and Roll”, since it later appears on
Loaded; in contrast, although both “Ocean” and “I’m Sticking
With You” were re-recorded for Loaded, they did not make that final cut and are
thus free-game.With thirteen songs remaining,
I simply dropped the two weakest tracks—the unnecessary filler “Ferryboat Bill”
and the long and uninteresting “I’m Gonna Move Right In”.The result is eleven solid tracks that run
nearly 40 minutes: the typical format for a Velvet Underground album!

Side A begins with Reed’s idea of an ironic and
intentionally-inane single designed specifically to ‘give FM radio what it wants’,
“We’re Gonna Have A Real Good Time Together”.Although Reed later re-recorded this unreleased song for his 1978 solo
album Street Hassle, this is the original Velvet Underground version taken from
Another View.Following is the barroom
snarl of “One of These Days”; this is the longer version found on the What Goes
On boxset, that runs about five seconds longer than the typical VU version.“Andy Chest”, a song Reed re-recorded for is
classic 1972 Transformer album, follows and is taken from the CD pressing of
VU.“Lisa Says” follows, a song Lou
re-recorded for his first solo album; it is taken from the Peel Slowly and See
boxset, which runs three seconds longer than the typical VU version.Concluding Side A is my own edit of “Foggy
Notion”, the first of two necessary ‘epic’ songs on a Velvet Underground
album.This reconstruction attempts to
make the longest possible complete version by using the guitar intro from the
vinyl pressing of VU and the longer-fade mix found on the What Goes On boxset.This “Foggy Notion” is now as long and
complete as possible, clocking in at 7:00 as opposed to the 6:45 version on VU.

Side B starts with a song Reed again re-recorded for his first
solo album in 1972, “I Can’t Stand It”, here using the best master found on
What Goes On.After “Coney Island
Steeplechase” from Another View, the longest version of “I’m Sticking With You”
is taken from Peel Slowly and See, in which the final chord of the song is more
articulated.A song re-recorded by
Reed for his 1976 solo album Coney Island Baby, “She’s My Best Friend” is the
long version taken from the promo cassette pressing of VU which runs 19 seconds
longer.The second necessary epic of the album, we have the superior master of another song re-recorded for Reed’s first solo
album: “Ocean”, which is taken from What Goes On.The album concludes with a serene What Goes On version of “Ride Into The
Sun” that actually features vocals, unlike the common Another View version.While they were clearly recorded at the same 1969 studio session (mislabeled on the What Goes On liner notes), this version is unfortunately
sourced from an old acetate rather than the remixed mastertapes.The result is that, while definitely listenable and certainly enjoyable,
“Ride Into The Sun” has a very obvious lower soundquality than the rest of the
album.But is that really a
problem?After all, we are talking about
The Velvet Underground here!This
acetate sounds as good as half of the songs on White Light/White Heat!This rougher acetate version seemed a perfect
fit to conclude the album, not to mention it's one of the best recordings the band ever made.

The resulting album reconstruction—which here I simply titled IV as it would
have been The Velvet Underground’s fourth album—lies somewhere between the band-oriented
garage-rock of White Light/White Heat and the serene pop sensibilities of The Velvet Underground.Without any pretense at all ("Are we even making an album right now? Oh well..."), it is a very clear
recording of the band playing directly, something they needed at this point of
their career, although no one actually did hear it at this point in their
career. But let's not fool ourselves; if they had, I doubt it would
have made much of a difference anyways. The Velvet Underground's fate was always sealed to be
ahead of their time.But now that that time
has passed, we can appreciate the simple beauty of a very honest Velvet Underground
album previously lost, as we celebrate Lou Reed’s ride into the sun.

This was a follower-request reconstruction for some time, so
I thought I’d finally buckle down and do it for you guys!This is a reconstruction of the unreleased Beach
Boys 1977 album Adult/Child.Initially
recorded as a solo project by Brian Wilson, almost all of it was scrapped and the
MIU Album was released instead in 1978.Here, the tracks which were officially released have been compiled from
their best sources, and the tracks not officially released have all been personally
remixed to match as closely as possible the fidelity of the officially released
ones.All tracks have been volume
adjusted correctly and appropriate banding time has been either added or taken
away, depending on the song.

Following a rush of confidence after completing Love You nearly
by himself, Brian Wilson continued work on a follow-up entitled Adult/Child,
another set of songs unabashedly autobiographical about his state of mind (and
physical health) at the time in 1976-1977.The title
was allegedly culled from Brian’s psychologist Eugene Landry, in which we can
only presume that the “Adult/Child” is Brian Wilson himself.Many of
the arrangements emulated the 1976 album 15 Big Ones, which had a decidedly Sinatra-esque
‘big band’ sound.As well as the new
compositions, Brian also dusted off a few outtakes from earlier in the decade, including
“HELP is On The Way” (which was promised but ultimately forsaken on Landlocked, a reconstruction I just
recently tackled) and “Games Two Can Play”.Unfortunately the album was canned by Reprise Records as not being
commercially viable, although the long-running rumor was that half of the Beach
Boys camp conveniently disliked the big band sound of Adult/Child anyways.The album was essentially replaced by the MIU
Album, headed up by Mike Love, and the sole Adult/Child survivor was “Hey Little
Tomboy”, which featured a new set of overdubs.

My reconstruction is rather straight forward as, while the
songs on Adult/Child aren’t necessarily A+ material in quality, it is an extremely
well-sequenced album as a whole and we are lucky to know what Brian’s intended track
sequence was to be.The biggest problem was
within the realm of volume adjustments, as each song implied a different
dynamic range.Even worse, each song
seemed to already have their own unique volume as they all came from vividly
different sources. Once we set certain album-peaks which featured
the loudest points in the album (“Shortenin’ Bread” for instance) this could be fixed.The second challenge was in
remixing roughly half of the album since seven of the tracks were never officially
released and exist only on bootlegs.I found
that the commonly bootlegged version—from a sometimes droppy cassette—seemed to
lack bottom end and some highs but the mids were intact (unlike the Landlocked
tapes).When reEQ’d, they seem to fit
wonderfully alongside the officially-released tracks.

One note must be made that no speed corrections were made to
my Adult/Child reconstruction.The reason
for this is that we do not have a reference point for some of the tracks, and
they seemed to sound fine by my ears (aside from the fact that I am not too
fond of digital speed correction)!It
also becomes tricky knowing Brian tinkered with tape speeds as a tool in the
recording studio; was a slowed tape intentional or not?Also, cassette dropouts were not fixed, as I
did not feel they detracted from the listening experience and, if I may be so
bold, adds an analog aura that seems to be lacking in today’s modern music
production.There is nothing like tape
errors to remind a listener that we are all human and perfection shouldn't necessarily
by our ultimate goal.

Side A begins with my own reEQd version of “Life Is For The
Living”.In contrast to other
reconstructions of Adult/Child, I did not sample an earlier part of the track
to replace this tape error as I felt it desecrated the intentional a capella
introduction, and is left as is.Next is
followed by the atrocious “Hey Little Tomboy” which is taken from the MIU
Album.While many prefer the unreleased
early mix found on the Adult/Child bootlegs, I felt a more completed mix
belonged here; also, the spoken word bridge section made my ears bleed in embarrassment.This is followed by “HELP Is On The Way”, the
exact same version as found on my Landlocked reconstruction, an edit of the
officially released mix from the Good Vibrations boxset.The brand new (and allegedly speed-corrected)
“It’s Over Now” from the Made In California boxset follows, along with my own
remix of “Everybody Wants To Live” to close the first side of the album.

Side B begins with a perplexing track that Brian was allegedly
obsessed with at the time, “Shortenin Bread”.This is a remixed version of the bootleg, not the version found on the
LA Album.“Lines” and “On Broadway”
follow, both remixed from a bootleg for improved soundquality.Next we have a not-too-shabby “Games Two Can
Play” taken from the Good Vibrations boxset, as well as a decent uptempo rocker
“It’s Trying To Say”, personally remixed from a bootleg.The album closes with “Still I Dream of It”,
taken from the Good Vibrations boxset.

My final touch was new, original cover art.I had noticed that there really isn’t any
logical bootleg cover art for Adult/Child, so I deemed this a top priority to
rectify for my reconstruction.Using the
MIU Album cover as a base—since this reconstruction essentially replaces the MIU
Album anyways—we have a cover more suitable than a random 1950’s postcard
illustration or a SMiLE-era ‘firehat’ picture of Brian Wilson.Although I recognize that Adult/Child
probably references a psychological state, I chose to go with a literal
direction with the artwork, using a silhouette of an adult and a child hand-in-hand;
who is to say that the title doesn’t have a double-meaning?If anything, this cover represents the
superficial meaning of the album with Landy’s prognosis relegated more
sympathetically to a subtext.With all
the honesty already present in the lyrics, maybe we are doing Brian a favor and
cutting him a little slack. Didn't he deserve it by 1977?

The third of a four-part Beach Boys upload, this is a
reconstruction of the unreleased 1970 Beach Boys album Landlocked, an early
version of the 1971 album Surf’s Up.All of the tracks that have been officially released have been compiled
from their best possible sources (spread over six different releases), and the
remaining unreleased tracks were personally remastered from bootlegs for their
best possible soundquality.All tracks
were volume-adjusted with appropriate track leader to create a finished,
cohesive album as a whole—the album that could have been Surf’s Up, as of late
1970.

Reconstructing any unreleased album from this period of The
Beach Boys’ recording history is tricky.Landlocked (or at least the sequence of songs that have come to be
associated with the title “Landlocked”) is actually one of three different
unreleased Beach Boys albums from the 1969-1970 period; to understand
Landlocked’s context we must examine her older twin sisters.Remember that what we think of as Landlocked
is essentially a tape of nine Sunflower outtakes (of which only one would make
the cut onto Surf’s Up) and four of the songs that The Beach Boys were then
currently working on for the Surf’s Up album (only two of those would make the
cut).Also of note that there has been
a dispute over whether this album ever existed at all!Some say that not only was“Landlocked” never really a serious working
title for the Surf’s Up album, but that this track sequence—which was indeed an
early running order for the album that eventually became Surf’s Up—was never
called Landlocked anyways.I will put
this argument aside for my blog’s purposes; the working title of Landlocked and
this specific tracklist has become linked—erroneously or not—over time.Besides, if Landlocked never really existed,
it would truly be an album that never was!

Landlocked’s genesis essentially came out of the band’s
flurry of studio activity in 1969 while making the Sunflower album.Between January and March The Beach Boys had
recorded nine-or-so songs, just falling short of an album’s worth of
material.Of these initial Sunflower
sessions, Landlocked’s “San Miguel” and “Loop De Loop” were recorded.A second session in July and August yielded
another four songs, with even more sessions resuming in October and continuing
until January 1970.The result was
nearly 30 songs, more than twice needed for an album!The first attempt to compile an album from these sessions, called
Reverberation and meant to complete their contract to Capitol Records, was
rejected for unknown reasons (this sequence contained the two aforementioned
Landlocked tracks recorded during the initial Sunflower sessions as well as an
instrumental “When Girls Get Together”).The Live In London album instead took Reverberations' place to fulfill
their contract, and the band compiled a completely different sequence of tracks
from the recording sessions as their first offering for Reprise Records.This second unreleased album Add Some Music
contained the eventual Landlocked tracks “When Girls Get Together” (with
vocals), “Susie Cincinnati”, “Fallin’ In Love”, “Carnival”, “I Just Got My
Pay”, “Good Time”, and “Take A Load Off Your Feet” and was eventually rejected
by Reprise for not having an immediately radio-friendly hit single.After a final recording session in July
1970, the strongest songs from the past year and a half of recording were resequenced
into what we know as the Sunflower album, leaving all of the aforementioned
tracks on the cutting room floor.But
what are some labels’ trash are other bands’ treasure, as the Sunflower rejects
became the seeds of The Beach Boys’ next project.

In August 1970, the band began recording their follow-up to
Sunflower, tracking“Lookin’ For
Tomorrow”, “Big Sur”, “Til I Die” and “H.E.L.P. Is On The Way”.By September, a tape was compiled of these
four new songs as well as the aforementioned nine Sunflower outtakes and
submitted to Reprise records (albeit with a Capitol Records letterhead!).While some claim that Landlocked was never
actually an early title for Surf’s Up, documentation connects the title to this
tape submitted to Reprise on this date.I am using this sequence for my Landlocked reconstruction as it was not
only historically accurate to the rough sequences at the time, but it simply
sounds great!Unfortunately, Reprise
Records disagreed; they rejected the album and new Beach Boys manager Jack
Rieley urged the band to restructure the album into a more commercial and
“socially relevant” album.The entire
Landlocked sequence bit the dust (save for “Lookin For Tomorrow” and “Til I
Die”) with their replacements recorded between April and May 1971.Included was the newly-finished SMiLE
outtake “Surf’s Up” which became the title track for the album’s release in
August 1971.But what of
Landlocked, the Surf’s Up that never was?Half the songs staggered out as b-sides and as exclusive tracks on
anthology releases, with another handful appearing only on bootlegs.Two were even rerecorded for later releases
(“Big Sur” and “When Girls Get Together”) and another found it’s way onto yet
another unreleased Beach Boys album (“H.E.L.P. Is On The Way” on Adult/Child,
which I will tackle shortly).Here we
can re-essemble what The Beach Boys really had in mind to follow-up their
Sunflower album before big-business pressures squeezed all of the fun out of
being landlocked.

Side A of my Landlocked reconstruction—the silly side—begins
with “Loop De Loop”, a song that Al Jardine had been tinkering on for some
time, even up until it’s release in 1998 on the Endless Harmony
soundtrack.But presented here is its
original 1969 mix, remastered from a bootleg to match the EQ of the final
version.“Loop De Loop” runs directly
into the original single mix of the upbeat rocker “Susie Cincinnati”, taken
from the 2000 compilation Greatest Hits Volume 3: The Brother Years.Note the modern remix found on the 2013 Made
In California box set was not used here because the mixing did not match the
aesthetics of the rest of the songs.The original mix of “San Miguel” follows, taken from the 1993 Good
Vibrations box set.Also from that box
is the transparent jingle “HELP Is On The Way” edited to match the original
Landlocked version (as noted on the September 1970 tape box).The goofy yet adorable “Take A Load Off Your
Feet” is culled from the most recent remaster of the Surf’s Up album and is
followed by the dizzying unreleased “Carnival”, again reEQ’d to match the rest
of my reconstruction.The side
concludes with “I Just Got My Pay” from the God Vibrations box set.

Side B—the serious side—opens with my own remaster of the
up-until-recently unreleased “Good Time”; the newly remixed version from Made
In California again omitted here because it frankly sounded better than the
rest of the songs, as well as a little light on backing vocals, in my
opinion.Following is my own remaster
of the unreleased original 1970 recording of “Big Sur”, particularly reEQd to un-muddy
the mix and bring out the missing highs and lows.Next, the modern remix of Dennis's “Fallin’ In Love”,
taken from the 2009 compilation Summer Love Songs, is re-edited to match the
original 1969 version.After my own
remaster of the unreleased original 1969 version of the equally brilliant
(musically) and inane (lyrically) “When Girls Get Together” is “Lookin’ For
Tomorrow”.This version is taken from
Surf’s Up as the overly flanged version seemed to fit the neo-psychedelic vibe
of the rest of the songs.Concluding
Landlocked is my one instance of creative license, the longer Steve Desper mix
of “Til I Die” found on the 1998 Endless Harmony Soundtrack.Although Landlocked would have actually
included a version of similar length to what was released on Surf’s Up, I felt
Desper’s longer version was more appropriate to end the album.

With the addition of a less-gruesome cover image to match
the carnival-on-acid vibe of the album, our reconstruction is complete.But how does our resulting Landlocked
compare to Surf’s Up and even Sunflower?For one thing, it is decidingly more psychedelic, goofier and more,
well, fun.The tracks don’t seem to be
concerned with commercial potential: just songs for their own sake.While Sunflower and much of Surf’s Up seem
overly serious, Landlocked seems whimsical and certainly doesn’t take itself
too seriously.We also have a sound
more reminiscent of the SMiLE era, although lacking the poetics of Van Dyke
Parks or any conceptual or sonic envelope pushing.But at the same time, one can surely see why Landlocked was never
released: it was not the correct album for The Beach Boys in the early
70s.If Sunflower and Surf’s Up were
the engines that drove the band for that decade, Landlocked was merely the dining
car, filled with libations and merriment, but unable carry the weight of the
whole train.But with that said, I’d
much rather be having a drink than shoveling coal…